Ethel Stanwood Bolton 1886 Gem Tintype Photo Album


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Mary Crane, 1886 (left)
1875 - ; married, 1911, Edward Francis McClennen; parents: Joshua Crane and Annie Eliza Jose; lived at 123 High St.

Upon graduation from Harvard Law School in 1895, her husband joined the law office of Louis Brandeis who later became the first Jewish Justice of the Supreme Court. Mary Crane’s marriage was not without some intrigue:

LAWYER ELOPES WITH HIS PARTNER’S WIFE
Robert W. Sawyer, Jr., and Mrs. Edward McClennen, prominent in Cambridge Society, Disappear Together
Both Madly Infatuated With Each Other

Mary Crane would find herself in the middle of a high-society scandal that was featured in a front-page double-type-headlined article (Boston Post, October 28, 1910). At the time she had been the close friend of Mary Bigelow Young, the wife of Edward McClennen, a prominent lawyer with the well-know law firm of Brandeis, Dunbar & Nutter. When Mrs. McClennen was away, Mary Crane often stayed at the McClennen’s house and cared for the children. The McClennens, who had recently completed a custom home at 35 Lakeview Ave., Cambridge, were close friends with Mr. and Mrs. Sawyer, he, a law associate of Mr. McClennen who lived around the corner at 77 Larch Rd. with his then pregnant wife and their two boys. Mary Young abrupty ran off with Robert Sawyer and Edward McClennen filed suit for divorce soon thereafter. Mary Crane cared for the children after the elopement and, ten months later, after the divorce was finalized, she and Mr. McClennen married.
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